DAY 9: Masada, the Dead Sea and Qumran -- Dead Sea Scrolls (5/10/12)

MASADA:

Masada is a Mountain fortress built 1320’ above the Dead Sea in the Judean wilderness. It was built by “Herod the Great.” He was an architect and prolific builder. This was to be his fortress of escape if he was ever overthrown. But he never stayed there, word is that he never even visited. It is an amazing place and was “almost” invincible in its day! In 70 AD in the midst of the Jewish revolt against the oppression of the Romans, Jerusalem and the Temple were destroyed by Titus the Roman General. The rebels fought and retreated to their “secret” place – Masada! It was “almost” invincible because after a three year siege by 8 Roman Legions it fell. When the Romans breached the wall, they found that the (estimated) 1,000 Jews (men, women and children) that were in Masada committed suicide rather than have the women ravaged, the children enslaved and the men put to death. Masada was destroyed by the Romans, however, because of its remote location they soon left it. It then remained abandoned almost 1,500 years. Once rediscovered, Masada began to give up its secrets. It was fully self-sufficient. It used a hydraulic principle to capture rain water from flash floods to fill cisterns built into the sides of the mountain. With one good rain storm a year, the floods would capture millions of gallons of water. It was enough for growing food, irrigation, drinking, bathing etc. FOR FIVE YEARS! Herod had two Roman Baths built on Masada, storehouses of food and weapons and a Palace for himself. Ten years ago (approximately) while excavating one of the “storage areas” on Masada, they uncovered an intact urn. The top was sealed. When they opened it, they found it was filled with dates from ancient date palms in the region. (subsequent research suggests that the urn wasn't filled with dates, but one of the seeds was regerminated successfully) These however seemed petrified from the age and dryness. They were taken to Hebrew University’s hydroponics lab and they attempted to rehydrate them to check the DNA. They had some success and planted several and they grew! The date palms that rose were like nothing anyone had seen. These were the original date palms of Judah. They had all been killed off in a disease sometime after this urn was sealed. Now they are planning to repopulate the land with the original palms. Dates are a source of fruit which honey is made from and a mainstay of historic Judah. They have made tremendous progress in restoring Masada since we were last there in 2008.

THE DEAD SEA:

The Dead Sea is 1300’ below sea level. It is one of the lowest dry point on earth. It is called a “Sea” when in reality it is a lake. The Sea of Galilee is the same. The reason they are called “sea” is that the Jewish people of the day had no word for lake. So they called it what they called any large body of water, a sea. The salt content is the second highest of any body of water in the world. The other is in Russia. The salt content in the Dead Sea is 33% making it “heavy” as water goes. As a result when you go in it, you float. It literally tries to spit you out. You lean back, raise up your feet and it is like you are in a hammock. The minerals in the water include many more than salt alone. This makes it a dangerous concoction. It will make you very sick if you drink it. (our last guid told us that if a grown man drank a jigger full he would die.) However, on your skin, it has a remarkable healing quality. People come from all over the world for treatments using the Dead Sea. We had a blast in it today. While you are in the water, it feels like there is baby oil all over your skin. When you get out, your skin is like a baby’s. The minerals come from the mountains that surround it. There is little vegetation in this region. There’s nothing there to stop the erosion of minerals into the sea. The Dead Sea is also shrinking a few inches every year. This is because they have dammed part of the watershed upstream that feeds it (like the Sea of Galilee) to provide for more human water consumption. They say they are working the problem and think they have a solution. Stay tuned!

QUMRAN:

In 1947 two shepherd boys (supposedly) while searching for a lost sheep, found one of the greatest historical and religious finds in history – The Dead Sea Scrolls! It proved to be a huge cash of scripture. The whole of the old testament (less the book of Esther and Nehemiah) in multiple copies were there. It is believed that the approach of the Romans to destroy Jerusalem in 70 AD, resulted in a desperate race by a group of scribes to hide the WORD OF G-D from certain destruction by the Romans. The accuracy of the 2000 year old text to today’s Bible is amazing. There were many important discoveries as well. For example, there have been allegations that the Book of Isaiah (the most frequently quoted by the New Testament) was said to have been rewritten and changed to insert the prophetic claims of a Messiah that seem to so clearly point to Christ. This proves that that did not happen. The scrolls are mostly located in Jerusalem. Some are in Amman Jordan. Others are in private “collections.” There were other books found as well. We will see some of the actual scrolls later in the week. Some more photos have been posted to the Visual Impressions page.

Maranatha!